Smudging

Smudging is the common name given to the sacred smoke bowl blessing. A powerful cleansing technique from the Native North American Tradition. Smudging calls on the spirits of sacred plants to drive away negative energies and restore balance. It is the art of cleansing yourself and your environment using simple ritual and ceremony. For thousands of years smudging has been a part of Native American tradition but now its power of cleansing is available to everyone.

The Power of Smudging

How can smudging be so powerful? The answer lies in the subatomic world of subtle or spiritual energy. Homes and bodies are not just made of purely physical matter; they also vibrate with quiet, invisible energy. Cleansing a space or our bodies with techniques such as smudging clears away all the emotional and psychic 'garbage' that may have gathered over the years or even hundreds of years. it's like spiritual spring cleaning. The effects of smudging can be surprisingly swift and dramatic. The rituals I will post in following lessons can help you banish stress, attract love, sooth you, or give you energy. They can bring your family closer together and let you adjust to the healing seasonal rhythms of the year. Above all they can turn any space, however humble, into a soothing sanctuary - a place of renewal and happiness. In the following lessons, I will attempt to combine smudging with techniques from other ancient traditions to provide a totally holistic approach.

The History Of Smudging

Smudging may seem a very modern practice. We read about city highfliers using it to sell their apartments or improve their business luck. But smudging has been used for thousands of years. When you light a smudge stick you are connecting with a spiritual tradition that originates from the depths of time.

A Tradition From The Mists Of Time

It is impossible to say for certain when smudging began. Perhaps early civilizations came to realize, through sheer trial and error, that the smoke generated by setting alight particular herbs had beneficial effects for humanity. Certainly many cultures have an old tradition of driving animals through smoke to kill off pests and diseases. Nowadays modern science has proven that certain herbs do indeed have cleansing powers, acting as strong pesticides. Aside from this beneficial and practical aspect of burning herbs, humans have become aware that smoke ascends to the heavens - to the world of spirits - almost as if it were acting as a spiritual messenger. The idea of purification through smoke is certainly not the sole preserve of the Native North Americans. Most rituals have some element of cleansing, and incense or herbal smoke mixtures are burned around the world - from China, India, and Southeast Asia, to Europe and the Western world.

The Native American Way

Originally, mixtures of sacred herbs and resins were burned in a special bowl. Smoke was then wafted around the person or place needing purification and cleansing. However, smudge sticks (bundles of dried herbs tied together with colored thread or a strip of hide) offer an easier way of smudging that is just as effective. The herbs most often used in smudge sticks are sage and sweet grass. Sage drives out negative thoughts, energies, spirits, and all influences. Sweet grass is used to attract positive energy after all the negative energies have been banished by sage. Native Americans see smudging as a way of shifting between various levels of reality connecting us here in the material, physical world to the subtle realm of spirits.